Skip to main content
Main

Tomato Chutney

A sweet and tangy tomato chutney made with tomatoes, apples, onions, peppers, raisins, salt, sugar, ginger, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Apple and cider are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,238 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Tomato Chutney

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the tomatoes and sprinkle ½ cup coarse sea salt over them. Let them drain for 24 hours.

  2. Add the chopped onions, apples, red peppers, and ginger to the drained tomatoes.

Cook

  1. Put the spices in a bag and add the brown sugar.

  2. Cover the mixture with cider vinegar and let it simmer for 4 hours.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Apple + cidertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,238 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Onion + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,595 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Form the bulk of the chutney and provide most of its moisture and body.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps thicken the chutney as it simmers.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that balances sweetness and helps preserve the chutney.
Ginger
Contributes warm aroma and a sharp, peppery bite.
Onions
Add savory depth and soften into the body of the chutney during cooking.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture.

The step that matters

Draining the salted tomatoes. Salt draws water out of the tomatoes by osmosis. Skipping or shortening the 24-hour drain leaves extra liquid that dilutes the flavour and makes the chutney runny after simmering.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, apple, onion, pepper, sugar, ginger, cider):

  1. Plumfits better
  2. Mangofits better
  3. Cherryfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, apple, onion, pepper, sugar, ginger, cider. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More tomato chutney recipes

Green 4 See all 35 →

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipesTomato BisqueTomato Bisque61 recipesApple SoupApple Soup33 recipes